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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/29528529">Smarties Cookies (non-violent)</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/redgoldblue/pseuds/redgoldblue'>redgoldblue</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Leverage</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>(under a different name), Coda, Eliot Spencer Whump, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Episode: s03e15 The Big Bang Job, F/M, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Multi, POV Parker (Leverage), apparently i'm starting a theme for leverage coda titles and that theme is food, cross-posted from Advent Calendar 2020</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-02-18</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-02-18</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-15 17:47:33</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>3,533</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/29528529</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/redgoldblue/pseuds/redgoldblue</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>The night after the Big Bang Job, Eliot shuts down and disappears. Parker and Hardison follow him, because of course they do.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Alec Hardison/Parker/Eliot Spencer</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>5</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>112</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Smarties Cookies (non-violent)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Like I said in the tags, this is cross-posted from the 2020 advent calendar, bc, well, I like it, and I appear to be building a body of work that's half-composed of codas so I may as well run with that theme.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>At some point, early on, before the three of them had figured it all out but after they’d realised there was something to figure out – before they’d blown up the offices – Parker had asked him. Well, not just asked him, with no prompting, she’d known he wouldn’t like <em>that</em>. Okay, maybe she hadn’t. Anyway, what actually happened was–</p><p> </p><p>“I gotta say, the whole ‘ooh big macho bad man’ thing is a lot less convincing now that I’ve known you for more than like, a week.” Hardison was sprawled out across three different chairs in the conference room, and Eliot squinted suspiciously at him over the back of the chair he’d spun around on the other side of the table.</p><p>“Most people get more intimidated after they’ve seen me work.”</p><p>“Most people haven’t seen you go to five different grocery stores looking for mini marshmallows because you can’t deal with having regular sized ones in your hot chocolate.”</p><p>“<em>I</em> can deal with regular marshmallows. Parker can’t.”</p><p>“Mini ones are better,” Parker said. Hardison jumped, nearly sending one of his chairs flying, and she realised they couldn’t see her from inside the air vents. She dropped down, making Hardison screw up his eyes and mutter, “Jesus,” and she briefly tried to come up with some way of sitting on the table where she could see both of them before giving up and sitting in the chair next to Eliot. It wasn’t that she had anything against chairs, exactly, but the table allowed more freedom of movement. </p><p>“Why would people get scared when they see you work?” she asked Eliot, who blinked at her. “I mean, it’s not like you kill people,” she attempted to explain. “Why don’t you kill people, anyway?”</p><p>Something in his face darkened, and he turned away slightly. He’d taken his hair out when they got back from the Nicaraguan Embassy, and the movement made it fall across his face, shadowing his eyes. “I just don’t. Seen too much death,” he said, words skipping over each other. “Inflicted too much death. Let’s go back to talking about marshmallows.”</p><p>Parker shrugged, and Hardison jumped in with some comment about chocolate moustaches, and that was that. </p><p>~</p><p>No-one had told Parker and Hardison what had happened in the warehouse or in the hangar before Moreau got on the plane, but when they’d gotten back, Eliot had stayed in the bar only just long enough to hear Nate tell them the basics of the plan before he’d disappeared upstairs. Parker, Hardison, and Sophie had all thrown worried looks at each other as Nate frowned at Eliot’s back, but they let him go. Half an hour later, Sophie cast a glance at the clock, jumped, and proceeded to chivvy all of them out of the bar, telling them that they needed their sleep if they wanted to take down Damien Moreau in an entirely different country. She walked off to wherever it was she was currently staying, and Nate, Parker, and Hardison ascended the stairs, waving tiredly to each other at the top as they separated.</p><p>It was dark inside their apartment, and Parker was halfway to the living room before Hardison had finished fumbling around, closing the door behind him and turning the light on.</p><p>Parker was good at seeing things in the dark, but it still surprised her seeing Eliot on the couch. He was sitting with his elbows on his knees, stock still, staring blankly ahead. Parker turned to check that there wasn’t anything on the TV, but he was looking at a blank screen. Hardison came in, and Parker looked at him. This wasn’t her thing, she didn’t know what to do with emotions. That was Hardison’s thing, when Sophie wasn’t around. Tech and emotions. Not that Eliot was really displaying any emotions, but for most people that was an emotion in itself, Sophie had said. Or it meant they were hiding emotions. Sometimes Eliot just hid what he was feeling because that was what he was used to doing, but this didn’t look like that. He was too still.</p><p>Hardison took a step towards the couch, and that must have set off something in Eliot’s head, because he jerked up, spinning until he was facing them. He wasn’t in a combat stance, exactly, but he was standing like he did when he was counselling Parker on techniques, right before he settled into a combat stance. Even though Hardison refused to let Eliot teach him properly, he must have recognised it too, because he stilled and raised his hands. “Hey, Eliot,” he said softly. “You okay?”</p><p>“I’m fine,” he said roughly. “You guys should go. No, wait.” He cast a glance around the apartment, looking like he was clocking where he was for the first time, and continued, “I should go.” He ran a hand through his hair and turned on his heel, heading for the door. Before he could get there, Hardison had dashed across and inserted himself between Eliot and the doorway. </p><p>“Nuh-uh,” Hardison started, and Parker slipped around the other side while Hardison had him distracted, to stand with her back against the door handle. “I am not letting you go wander the streets in the middle of the night having a panic attack and scaring innocent civilians. Me and Parker, we’re the innocent civilians.”</p><p>Eliot dropped his head slightly, levelling his gaze up through his eyelashes at the taller Hardison. </p><p>“It’s no use looking at me like that, I know you’re not actually going to punch me. At the best of times, let alone right now. And hey, even if you did, Parker’s right there,” Hardison said, gesturing behind him at Parker, who was oddly touched that he’d noticed her moving. “You gonna punch Parker to get out? Huh? No?”</p><p>Eliot winced slightly and looked away. </p><p>“Didn’t think so.”</p><p>Eliot glanced back at both of them, then spun and stalked back into the flat and through to the kitchen. Parker and Hardison looked at each other, and Parker shrugged. Hardison sighed, then said, “C’mon,” and followed Eliot into the kitchen, Parker trailing behind him. She didn’t like seeing Eliot like this, but it was better than leaving him alone. </p><p>He was sitting behind the island, back to the hard marble. His legs were drawn up to his chest, arms folded on top of them and head resting on his arms. It was such an uncharacteristic pose for their brash, broad-chested Eliot that she froze in place for a second. He’d gotten bigger and louder over the last year, like he was finally, instinctually, comfortable taking up his space around them, and it made this look even more wrong. Before they’d gotten Nate out of jail, he’d always sort of seemed like he was sitting in the corner even when he was in the middle of the room, and now he felt like that again. His hair should’ve fallen forward to cover his face in this position, but somewhere between the front door and the kitchen he’d roughly tied it back. Parker really, really wanted to reach over and pull out the tie, like his emotions would all spill out with his hair and he’d stop looking all locked up and hurt and robotic. That wasn’t what Eliot was supposed to be like. He was quiet (at least, next to Hardison), but he wasn’t silent. He was steady, not flat. </p><p>Hardison dropped to sit on the floor across from him, pulling his long legs up enough that they didn’t trap Eliot in but not so much that they didn’t bump against him. Parker swung up onto the counter next to where Eliot was sitting, because she didn’t think they should both be across from him. That would seem too much like they were trying to fight together against him. He needed to feel like someone had his back. Hardison frowned up at her, because he didn’t always get how her and Eliot’s brains worked, but when she nodded, he looked back at Eliot. </p><p>“Hey, Eliot.” There was no reaction, and Hardison sighed and continued, “Why’d you try to run away, man?”</p><p>Eliot’s head was still buried in his arms, but his words were clear as a bell. “Dangerous. Shouldn’t be around you two when I’m dangerous. Might hurt you. Can’t hurt you.” Even though he was dropping the pronouns, he said it in a monotone, like they were just simple facts that he was reciting, and it made Parker’s chest hurt. Of course he was dangerous, that’s why they needed him on jobs, but he wasn’t dangerous to <em>them</em>. He was never dangerous to them. </p><p>“Hey, Eliot, baby.” It was a pet name Hardison hardly ever used on them, not seriously like this, and it meant Eliot had made his chest hurt too. It was probably unintentional that it was the most innocent name possible, but good. Babies were very non-threatening. “I don’t know what you did, but whatever it was, that was the old Eliot. It’s not who you are anymore. And we trust you. New Eliot. Hey.” He reached out and patted Eliot’s knee, the sort of brief questioning touch that he knew to do with either of them. When Eliot leant into it, he lifted his hand and ran it along the back of Eliot’s head. Eliot relaxed into it for a moment, then tensed again and withdrew, lifting his head up.</p><p>“Hardison, I threw you in a pool, man, why are you–” He gestured between Hardison and the rest of the room. Hardison seemed to know what the gesture meant, which was good, because Parker couldn’t really tell other than ‘something Hardison was doing’, which had been obvious from the words anyway.</p><p>“Technically, Moreau threw me in a pool, you didn’t actually lay a hand on me,” Hardison pointed out. “And yeah, I was mad about it, and don’t get me wrong, it’d take a lot of convincing to get me near water with you for a while, or actually near water at all, I might not go swimming ever again if I can help it–”</p><p>Parker glared at him, and he realised what he was saying and switched course. “But I mean, I figure, if you’d pulled me out we would’ve just both been shot by all his henchmen, y’know? And your best chance at saving me was to keep talking, and it’s a good thing you kept a clear enough head to know that, because I definitely would’ve just gotten us killed if I’d been where you were.”</p><p>“Yeah, it’s my job not to get you killed. I didn’t do great at it today.” He was breathing just slightly too fast and deep, but Parker didn’t know what to do about it.</p><p>“Hey!” Hardison objected, spreading his hands. “We’re all alive. No-one died.”</p><p>Parker couldn’t see Eliot’s expression, but whatever it was, it made Hardison rock back slightly and correct himself to, “Uuuhhh… none of the good guys died?”</p><p>“You <em>know </em>that good guy-bad guy thing is bullshit, Hardison,” Eliot replied, and he mostly just sounded sad, but at least there was a tiny bit of anger behind it. Anger was good, anger got you up and made you say and do the things that needed to be said and done.</p><p>“Okay, but. Did someone die? Who died?”</p><p>Eliot’s fists clenched, and his head dropped again.</p><p>“Alright, you don’t have to tell us.”</p><p>Parker sort of wanted to know, but it seemed like this might fall under Eliot’s earlier request for her not to ask, so she stayed silent. Whoever he’d killed, she was sure they’d deserved it, and she didn’t really care anyway, so. It was fine.</p><p>“Like I said, we trust you anyway,” Hardison said, and she nodded, even though Eliot couldn’t see her. “Just…” He held out one hand, resting it palm-up on his own knee, where Eliot would be able to reach it. “Let us help? With whatever this is?”</p><p>Eliot stayed silent, but Parker shook her head at Hardison when he opened his mouth to speak again. Hardison knew about waiting for them, so he closed it again.</p><p>It took a while, until Hardison had started looking like he really really wanted to say something, but eventually Eliot shook his head a tiny bit and reached one hand out to Hardison.</p><p>Eliot’s fingers were resting in Hardison’s now, but just barely, so lightly that Parker wasn’t even sure Hardison would be able to feel it. Parker swung around, hooked her toes over the back of the island so she wouldn’t have to think about maintaining the position, and lowered herself down until her torso was hanging next to Eliot. After a moment, he reached one hand up near hers. She didn’t really want to touch, all the locked up and sad and scared in the air had made her skin go funny, but sometimes Eliot smiled when she touched him, and he needed to know that they didn’t find <em>him</em> scary, so she reached down and took it. She wasn’t sure if she was just imagining it because she was watching him so closely, but it seemed like his shoulders relaxed a little bit at that, so she firmly told herself that she didn’t care about the touching – it wasn’t that bad, anyway, because it was Eliot – and squeezed his hand tighter.</p><p>“I haven’t felt – like this – for years,” Eliot muttered. “Not proper like.” His words were running together, kind of, but not messily or jerkily, more like that– that music thing, that he and Hardison said sometimes. Slurring, but the music version, where you just pushed the noises together without stopping. </p><p>“Can I take your hair tie out?” Parker asked, because it really didn’t seem right for it to be tied back if he was opening up now, and maybe it’d help him to say things. Eliot and Hardison both shot her slightly confused looks, like they sort of understood it but not really, but that was good. That was more normal, both of them not <em>really</em> getting something she said, and they usually didn’t need an explanation to go along with her anyway, so she didn’t bother explaining. </p><p>“Sure,” Eliot said, and dipped his head again to let her access it. She twisted to the side and carefully pulled it out, keeping her fingers away from his head in case he didn’t want her to touch it. He didn’t like people playing with his hair sometimes, the same way she didn’t, only she didn’t like it ever and other times he did like it. But she hadn’t checked this time.</p><p>His hair fell out, dropping over his shoulders, and she sighed in relief as she slipped the hair tie onto her own wrist. He pushed it behind his ear on the side she was on, so that she could still see his face, and he looked a bit more relaxed too. Still in pain, but like maybe he was letting himself notice it now.</p><p>“You haven’t felt like this?” Hardison prompted.</p><p>“Not since– not since I left Moreau. Well, a couple months after.”</p><p>“What do you feel like?” Parker asked, and Eliot turned his head to look at her.</p><p>“Like… you know how you feel when you don’t understand why your brain’s making you do something? And when someone tries to push you into feeling something? And when you’re faced with a safe, and you know you can’t crack it, and there’s a guard on the other side of the door?”</p><p>She nodded. She knew all of those feelings. They were bad feelings, and she appreciated that he was actually trying to help her understand, even while he was feeling like that.</p><p>“It’s like all of that at once, only I’m the one trying to push myself into feeling it, and I’m the guard on the other side of the door. And I’m not…” He dropped both of their hands, and roughly shook out his arms. “I don’t know what to do with that, other than punch something.”</p><p>“You wanna go in the exercise room? We can come watch you go to town on a punching bag, if you want,” Hardison offered.</p><p>Eliot shook his head, sighing. “Wouldn’t actually help, I don’t think. I’m just…” He dropped his head down until his forehead was resting in his hands, and told the floor in a near-whisper, “I’m back to being violence. That son of a bitch took me straight back to being nothing but violence.”</p><p>Parker blinked away the burning at the corner of her eyes that Eliot’s voice had caused, and reached down to him again, patting his shoulders until he looked up at her. She knew that feeling too. Not being violence, but she knew about being made to feel like you were nothing but the one thing that other people could use you for. “You’re not,” she said, then checked to make sure he was actually looking at her, listening to her, before she repeated, “You’re not, you’re our Eliot, and you cook us dinner and hug Hardison and help me fix my gear and catch me when I jump off buildings and you tell Hardison when he’s being stupid and get mad at Sophie when she tries to con any of us but always forgive her anyway and you love us and none of that is violence.”</p><p>He blinked at her for a moment, then leant in and kissed her, softly, upside-down like Spider-Man and Gwen. (She knew that because Hardison kept a stack of those comics under the bed and she’d read them all one weekend when she was bored.) </p><p>“And we love you for all of it, because it’s all you,” Hardison said. “Do I get a kiss too, or do I have to give a full speech first?”</p><p>“Depends, how good’s the speech?” Eliot asked, and his voice was still a bit gravelly, but he was joking. Parker’s speech had worked.</p><p>“I mean, I’m sure it would be great, it’s me, but it might not be able to top Parker’s.”</p><p>Eliot almost smiled, blinking slowly. “Thanks,” he said quietly, directed at both of them, but more at Hardison, because he was the one who needed to hear things out loud.</p><p>Hardison leant forward, bumping against Eliot’s legs in a mirror of what Eliot did all the time to him. Eliot dropped his legs down in response, stretching them out so that Hardison could cross his own and scooch over into Eliot’s space. Parker flipped around and dropped down next to him, bumping against his shoulder before leaning into Hardison, and Eliot turned slightly and buried his face in the point where her and Hardison’s shoulders met. Parker put one arm around his back, and Hardison met her from the other side, curling their hands together. She stayed there for as long as she could, focusing on feeling Eliot’s breathing against her, and when it was finally slow and steady, she dropped Hardison’s hand and slipped back. Hardison wrapped his other arm around Eliot and squeezed tightly for a moment, then they both let go and Eliot leant back, shaking out his hair. “Sorry, Parker,” he said. “You didn’t have to hug us. But thank you.”</p><p>“It’s okay. Welcome.”</p><p>“Hey,” Hardison said, nudging Eliot with his foot. “Wanna make cookies? I’ve got a packet of Smarties somewhere. Smarties cookies are pretty non-violent.”</p><p>“It’s past midnight,” Eliot pointed out. “We should sleep.”</p><p>“You gonna be able to get to sleep?”</p><p>“No,” he admitted. “But you two should sleep.”</p><p>“No way.”</p><p>“No, I wanna make Smarties cookies,” Parker added. It would help Eliot, <em>and </em>then they’d have Smarties cookies, so there was really nothing about this situation that wasn’t a win.</p><p>“…alright,” Eliot agreed.</p><p>“It’s actually 2am, by the way,” Hardison said as he got up and opened up the cupboard to rummage for the Smarties.</p><p>“2am cookies!” Parker exclaimed, leaping to her feet, Eliot following her up a little more slowly. “2am cookies are the best type,” she told Eliot seriously, and he got his weird little grin that he sometimes got when she said things to him.</p><p>“Even when they’re made from the same ingredients as 2pm cookies?” he asked.</p><p>“Yeah. It’s about the aura of 2am.”</p><p>“Okay. We gonna save Nate and Sophie some of them, or do they lose their quality once it’s daylight again?”</p><p>Parker had to consider that. She’d never actually eaten 2am cookies during the day. “I don’t know,” she concluded. “We’ll have to make enough, so we can find out.”</p><p>“Extra batches of 2am Smarties cookies, got it.”</p><p>Parker bumped her shoulder against his as she passed by him, and he bumped back against her and smiled slightly at her, a proper Eliot smile. She would have sacrificed ever getting to eat 2am cookies again to make sure he kept smiling like that, so the fact that they’d come together, she– well, she would have taken it as a sign that the universe was on their side if she thought the universe sent signs like that. As it was, she just took it as a reason to be happy. For all of them to be happy.</p>
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